The Valentine’s Selected Exhibitions by Decade

Download Collections in the Classroom: The Valentine’s Selected Exhibition List (pdf)

ESSENTIAL QUESTIONS

• What stories does the museum choose to tell?
• What changes do you notice in the kinds of exhibits/stories the museum displayed over time? What trends do you see?
• Do you see a shift in the exhibit titles from a focus on furniture styles, home goods and art toward a focus on how people live and community stories? Why?

CONTEXT

The idea of a Valentine Museum dates back to 1848, when founder Mann Satterwhite Valentine II (1824–1892) wrote on collecting objects: “Today I thought of procuring relics of all places dear to memory.” This private museum phase of the Valentine lasted until Mann Valentine died in 1892, leaving his collection of art and artifacts, the Wickham House and an endowment of $50,000 to establish a public museum that opened in 1898. How the museum has told our community’s stories has changed over the decades. Take a look at some of the museum’s exhibit titles from the past.